Hatfill Speaks Out

JACK DOLAN

The man at the center of the FBI probe of last fall's anthrax attacks launched a public campaign this weekend proclaiming his innocence and trying to quell what he described as a humiliating ``feeding frenzy'' for information about his personal life.

But if Dr. Steven J. Hatfill is more troubled by recent invasions of his privacy than by the evidence that led to two high-profile FBI searches of his apartment this summer, as he contends, he might want to stay off eBay for a while.

A suit to protect against chemical contamination, a vest with loops to attach 40 rocket-propelled grenades, and a ``Star Trek: Deep Space Nine'' technical manual are among the personal items neighbors scavenged from a trash bin as the physician and former Army biowarfare researcher moved out of his apartment last week.

``Who knows, something like this here could be valuable on eBay if things don't turn out right for him,'' he said.

Such is life for the man federal officials say is just one of dozens of scientists under scrutiny because they had access to the strain of anthrax used in the attacks and the knowledge to use it as a weapon. So far, Hatfill is the only one who has been publicly served with a search warrant in connection with the investigation.

Hatfill, reading from a two-page prepared statement before a throng of microphones and cameras outside his lawyer's office on Sunday, called himself the ``designated fall guy'' for a struggling federal investigation.

``After eight months of one of the most intensive public and private investigations in American history, no one -- no one -- has come up with a shred of evidence that I had anything to do with the anthrax letters,'' Hatfill said.

Hatfill claimed that he never handled anthrax and didn't have access to the labs where it was kept during his two years working at Fort Detrick, the Army's premier biowarfare research lab in Frederick, Md. He also said that while he had been immunized against anthrax and many other pathogens found at Fort Detrick, he claimed that he hadn't had an annual booster shot since 1999.

Hatfill answered no questions after reading his statement. His lawyer, Victor Glasberg, refused to discuss the colorful background that has fanned interest in Hatfill as a possible suspect. Nor would Glasberg discuss why Hatfill lost his security clearance last year. Neither would talk about allegations that Hatfill embellished the resume he used to get work with the government in 1997.

That resume reportedly claimed that he had been a member of the U.S. military's special forces and had a doctoral degree from a South African university. Neither is true.

``I do not claim to have lived a perfect life. Like yourselves, there are things I would do or say differently than I did 10, 20 or more years ago,'' Hatfill said.

Hatfill also did not discuss boasts he has made about serving with elite units of the white minority government army in Rhodesia -- later Zimbabwe -- during a civil war against black rebels while he attended medical school there. Accusations that the white government unleashed anthrax on black villages during the war in the late 1970s have lingered for decades, but have never been proved.

While Hatfill's name has only been in the public domain since a search of his apartment in late June attracted intense publicity, a small band of defense industry insiders told the FBI last October that he matched their theoretical profile of the killer. The same people shared information about Hatfill with Barbara Hatch Rosenberg, a scientist who monitors bioweapons for the Federation of American Scientists.

Without naming Hatfill, Rosenberg has published on the Internet profiles of an alleged suspect that match his career closely. Rosenberg also discussed Hatfill -- again without using his name, she said -- with staffers from the offices of Sen. Tom Daschle and Sen. Patrick Leahy, where anthrax-tainted letters arrived last October. The first highly publicized search of Hatfill's apartment this summer came one week after that discussion.

``I don't know Dr. Rosenberg,'' Hatfill said on Sunday. ``The only thing I know about her views is that she and I apparently differed on whether the United States should sign on to a proposed modification of the International Biological Weapons Convention. This was something I opposed and believe she favored. I am at a loss to explain her reported hostility and accusations.''

Rosenberg could not be reached for comment Sunday evening.

Hatfill and Glasberg also accused the FBI of damaging the scientist's reputation by improperly leaking information about Hatfill to the news media, even though he has never been officially named a suspect.

Glasberg said he was called recently by a network television official who said they had obtained a copy of a bioterrorism novel that Hatfill had been working on and was stored on a computer seized by federal agents during one of this summer's searches. Glasberg said nobody other than federal investigators could have had access to that novel.

Hatfill said the FBI promised that the summer's first search -- which was done without a warrant because Hatfill consented -- would be ``private, quiet and low key.'' Instead, the FBI arrived in a huge truck with agents clad in ``space suits'' with television news helicopters swirling overhead.

Following the second high-profile search of Hatfill's apartment last week, Lousiana State University officials delayed by 30 days the start of Hatfill's duties to begin training police, firefighters and other emergency officials on how to respond to chemical and biological attacks. The delay, which LSU officials termed a suspension, would be with pay.

Glasberg said Hatfill hopes he'll be able to assume the duties at LSU, which come with a reported $150,000 annual salary, when the suspension expires.

That's better than the scavengers are likely to do with the relics pulled from the rubble of what Hatfill has called his ``wasteland'' of a life. Even they concede that their collection, which includes a 30-pound dumbbell, a Purple Heart medal and a rug with the CIA emblem emblazoned on a field of blue will be most valuable as conversation pieces.

But Hatfill friend and media adviser Patrick Clawson, a former CNN reporter who now works as a salesman for the radio network that produces Oliver North's show, said the scavenged property reveals more about the neighbors than about Hatfill.

``Steve lectured on biowarfare, he probably used the suits as props. And it's not unusual for anyone in our social circle to collect military paraphernalia,'' Clawson said. ``But the character of those people, that's just obscene. ``